Art of Destruction
by LejindaryBunny
Summary: Just who or what is Peeves? Some thoughts...


A/N: I donno, it just sort of came to me while I was sitting in the   
cafeteria alone after school, waiting for my mom to pick me up. Its   
not really a story, but its not quite an essay either, it's just about  
what Peeves is. It actually might be the beginning of a story though,   
from his point of view. I'm not sure if I'll write it though, unless   
people are actually interested. I think this would be the first story   
centering around him, wouldn't it? And firsts are certainly an   
endangered species in the area of Harry Potter...Oh, just go on and   
read it.  
  
Disclaimer: ...anyone reading this who thought I owned the Harry Potter  
universe would have to be pretty stupid, wouldn't they? Let's all  
point and laugh at them!  
  
The Art of Destruction  
  
By LejindaryBunny  
  
  
  
That Peeves was a one of the castle ghosts was a misconception. He   
was in fact a poltergeist and, yes, there is a difference, a rather  
large one at that. Peeves had never lived. He had never died. He simply  
was.  
  
Muggle paranormalists have a something of a fascination with so-called  
'poltergeist activity' which is characterized by physical and usually   
destructive changes in the environment. Examples include doors suddenly   
shutting in peoples faces, expensive vases throwing themselves crashing   
to the floor for no apparent reason, and people pitching head first down   
flights of stairs as though someone had tripped them. These muggles   
have speculated that, unlike ghosts and other apparitions which tend   
not to be able to affect the physical world, that these events are  
caused not be the souls of the troubled dead, but instead the troubled  
living, usually overstressed adolescents. This actually is much closer   
to the truth than muggles come to explaining most extraordinary   
phenomena and indeed the theory is not entirely wrong.  
  
The students at Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry are   
exactly the same as regular adolescents in nearly all respects. They are  
subject to the same pressures to do well in classes, in sports, they  
have friend problems, and enemies and love trouble, and they dislike   
their teachers. They have the normal desire to vent these frustrations   
in a vengeful and destructive sort of way.  
  
There is however one key difference between Hogwarts students and  
their muggle counterparts. Hogwarts students have magic.  
  
Peeves was in fact the single oldest occupant of the castle, having   
started to come into being three days before the school's first final   
exams. Tensions were running high and tempers were on the very edge. He   
manifested first as a phantom wind, scattering a large number of   
uncorrected History of Magic essays down a very recently mopped hallway.  
The next day a crystal ball seemingly lifted itself off the table and   
flew around the Divinations classroom donking people on the head.   
During lunch the great hall rang with a disembodied voice shouting   
unprintable limericks about the four Hogwarts founders who were present  
at the time. (To say Slytherin was irate would be like saying the sun   
was a little warm.) The same voice whispered incorrect ingredients and   
measurements into the ears of students taking their first Potions exam.  
That evening a student was relaxing eyes closed, sprawled over an   
armchair. She opened her eyes to the unpleasant sight of a grinning,  
befreckled face less than an inch from her nose.  
  
'Boo.'  
  
The girl screamed rather loudly, having been treated to witness   
Peeves very first visible manifestation. He, on the other hand, wafted   
off in a fit of giggles.  
  
Peeves was and is the personified manifestation of all the nastier   
impulses, whether conscious or not, that students have and never do for  
the simple reason they were they to follow these impulses they would be  
given detention, expelled, imprisoned, hanged etcetera. These feelings  
and desires coupled with the sheer magnitude of magic energy thrown   
around every day on the environs combined to unintentionally create an   
entity to carry out the pranks that no one could do and make the awful  
remarks that no one would say. In actuality Peeves is the result and   
recipient of all the anxiety of teenage life and the creature with the   
capability to release these tensions. The wreaking of various forms   
of havoc and mischief in response to these tensions are literally   
his reason for being, effectively making him a perpetually  
outgoing, angst ridden, shameless delinquent of a teenager. It his place   
in the world to muddy the entrance of the castle as Filch walks in,  
to trip Neville Longbottom down the stairs and to say all the very rude   
things to Snape's face that everyone would love to say but would like  
to continue breathing.  
  
It is generally agreed that Peeves does all this very well.  
  
***  
  
A/N: Hmmm...So, what do you think of it? I'd love to hear your opinion  
so please, please, please review! 


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